Little Sister
by Persona-Memories
Summary: When you've been fostered into a rich household, how do you handle an older brother, despised by his own family? One shot. Rated T for mention of illicit drug use.


SUMMARY: 12-year-old Tsubaki has been placed in the Suoh family as a foster daughter. How can she survive in the household if the father and grandmother don't like even the heir to their family? Rated T for generally mentioned illicit drugs.

NOTE: I'm making this a one-shot, but if I get enough replies, I might make it longer. It's still undecided right now, though, so I need everyone's help! Please enjoy!

**Little Sister**

Tsubaki was silent as she padded down the thickly carpeted hallways of the 2nd largest Suoh family estate. Her pajamas—not the ones that the Chairman of Ouran Academy had provided her with, but her own clothes that she'd managed to keep—were soft from use and washing, thin and breathable in the stuffy manor as she tip-toed down the stairs towards the kitchen in her white socks with a hole in the toe of one. Tsubaki slipped past the head maid, going through her daily ritual of stretches whilst commanding the lesser maids in the tasks of what exactly needs to be done and what the time limit they have on their each and every activities. Delicately opening the kitchen door, she quickly avoided a head-on collision with a maid carrying a tray of food for her new "brother", Tamaki Suoh.

Tsubaki didn't want to be a Suoh, or even a temporary Suoh. She just wanted to be Tsubaki again and have her mom back. She didn't care that she wasn't rich, and didn't particularly like having dresses forced upon her and all her own clothes from home taken away from her, to be thrown away. She wanted her bedroom with no window and the flaking white paint revealing another off shade of white underneath, her apartment with the stupid broken toilet that you had to flush twice for it to work at all, the broken pilot light that wouldn't let the right half of the stove's top burners turn on. She even missed the stupid people in the apartment upstairs that always seemed to be moving their heavy crap around, including at 3:47 in the morning while she was working on an essay for school.

Randomly grabbing a durable white cloth napkin, Tsubaki grabbed a few rolls, a bottle of vitamin water, some small cheese cubes, and two apples before having to duck around three bustling maids and sneak out the back door to the garden. Avoiding the seven full-time gardeners for the Suoh family was complicated and was timed very delicately. Luckily for Tsubaki, the old farts didn't like change and were always on time in their schedules. She snuck past 1-4 swiftly enough, barely made it past 5, made a fairly close call with both 6 and 7, but finally made it to the back right corner of the garden. The brick wall in this particular corner of the garden had a small crack that, when situated most comfortably, Tsubaki could see the outside world again without fear.

Breaking out the meager amount of food, Tsubaki ate slowly as she watched the outside world. Even though it was not the cramped city she was used to, it was the outside world, free and wild and left unchecked by mankind, unshaped to fit man's own whims, and she absolutely loved it. As the cherry blossoms fluttered down on her from the trees in the garden, Tsubaki peeked out at a fox and it's child raiding a berry bush. _Reminds me of the way I get food around here,_ she thought with a chuckle. Tsubaki reminded herself that she had rushed through the last portion of gardeners and what might happen if she got caught. Although she knew they would never entertain the thought of beating her within an inch of her life and leaving her out on the streets, she got carried away within her imagination whilst her picnic continued. If she got found out, they would take her back into the manor, the head maid would notify the Chairman, and she'd be locked in her "bedroom" for the remainder of the day.

Tsubaki walked back of her own free will, however much she wished to leave. Climbing up the steps, she hurried back to the room the Chairman designated for her and went into the large walk-in closet. Hidden in a shelf in the very back were her clothes, left by one of the maids who had pity on her, although Tsubaki herself didn't know which one it was. She pulled off her pajamas, stuck them in a corresponding drawer that she knew the same maid who preserved her clothes would wash and replace them, and redressed in clean jeans, a gray padded vest with a high collar and a hood, a Guinness beanie, and her mother's cross ring on a chain around her neck, not even bothering to replace her socks with clean ones due to her plans for the day.

Leaving the closet, she intended to act like a menace for this household until the government would release her mom from rehab and let them go home. As far as Tsubaki knew, this family didn't even want Tamaki, the heir to the family name. Tsubaki had heard from one of the gossiping maids that Tamaki's grandmother hated him, only tolerated him as the only possible heir to the family title. What purpose Tsubaki was to fulfill in this enormous household, she had no idea. Certainly she was not going to cooperate, however. Not only did her desire to leave and be with her mother burn a fire inside her, but after hearing that—like her own family, in a way—the family did not accept Tamaki, they threw gas on the fire. Tsubaki knew there was nothing she could do to help this boy, one that she'd never even seen for the two weeks that she'd been residing at the Suoh estate. But there was, if she could pull it off, a way to make things easier on him.

She snuck out of her room yet again and did everything to harass the maids, the workers, and cause as much havoc as she could to make her seem like the worst child in the world. _If I can make them get rid of me, they'll be happy that they have Tamaki instead of me._ She'd never heard a bad word from anyone about Tamaki, regardless of his grandmother's loathing. If the Chairman got word of how awful Tsubaki behaved, he'd appreciate what must be the cool, well-behaved demeanor of Tamaki more. After running around the garden with a shovel she'd stolen from one of the gardeners and disposed of behind her, Tsubaki ran back into the mansion, smearing tiny clumps of dirt into the pristine white carpet in her mad dash, and sprinted into the kitchen. Ripping off pieces of meats, grabbing fruits, and snatching breads, she made it out with one maid calling behind her insipidly, useless rambling to Tsubaki's adrenaline-high, child-like mind.

Panting, Tsubaki finally stopped running. She was in an unfamiliar part of the estate, although much to her was unknown in the first place. Resting in a hallway far from the sounds of the maids working, Tsubaki sank to the ground against the wall and began to eat. Finishing her meal off by licking her fingers greedily—she had to admit, even if she didn't like this place, they had some pretty tasty foods—Tsubaki continued down the corridor she was in. At the very end of the hall, she found a door unlike the others in the mansion. It was hidden in the wall, barely discernable by the faintest of shadows showing it to be slightly ajar from the wall. Looking around warily, Tsubaki tested the door. She found that, to open it, she would need to push it inwards along the left edge. Putting her whole weight into it, Tsubaki pressed her body against the line of the door that cast that signaling shadow. The door made a click, and then swung inward easily. Taking one last glance over her shoulder to make sure she wasn't being followed, Tsubaki entered the room, the door swinging shut silently behind her.

The room she was in now had a large skylight instead of electricity to see by. The center of the room held only one thing—a white lacquered grand piano and a matching bench. Tsubaki stood warily in the shadowed portion of the room by the door, conflicting feelings alighting her senses. Tsubaki loved the piano; her mother had put her in lessons when she was little, and she still retained a fairly good idea of how to play well. She desperately wanted to go straight over to the piano and play until the end of time. But, directly across from her, past the piano and at the other side of the room, there was another door. This one did not look secretive like the one she had entered. She had suddenly become afraid of what, or who, might enter the room as soon as she sat down.

Tsubaki stood there, awaiting the arrival of someone else. No one came. She felt like she'd stood there for hours, awaiting the arrival of a person who would never come. _I'm acting like I'm waiting for Gedouh, _she scolded. _Stop being a chicken, Tsubaki! _With little more hesitation, Tsubaki stepped into the light filtering in from the ceiling and went to the piano bench.

Tsubaki opened the lid to the bench and found old music books, most of them in French. They were well preserved, only the dates written on the inside covers giving away their true age. She shut the lid without removing any of the old books, all ownership spaces filled out in French with Japanese underneath in parentheses. Every last one of the books read: Property of Tamaki Suoh. Sitting gingerly on the bench, reminding herself that she mustn't get found out, Tsubaki slowly and gingerly lifted the cover off of the keys and pushed it back. Playing middle C at a pianissimo, she found the piano to be in perfectly in tune, as if it had been tuned just this morning by hand. _It really may _have_ been tuned this morning,_ Tsubaki reminded herself guardedly. She warmed up her fingers with a few scales, and went into playing Sakura Kiss by Hirano Yoshihisa. The way she played it sounded a little slow and clumsy until she got to the middle of the piece. Her fingers lost their fear and so did her mind.

She played all her dynamics at their actual volume instead of dragging it down to a quieter pitch. She played music from the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, COOL JOKE, Orange Range, Asian Kung-Fu Generation, Utada Hikaru, Aya Hirano, Takeharu Ishimoto, G-Dragon, L'Arc-en-Ciel, T.M. Revolution, Suga Shikao, DJ Camaro, Vocaloids, Nana Kitade, and Last Alliance. As she sang along to Rewrite by Asian Kung-Fu Generation, she realized that she didn't care if someone came in. She didn't care if the head maid, the Chairman, Tamaki Suoh, or even Tamaki's grandmother herself came it. She could blow them off if she had this piano and a voice to sing with. She could do anything. She could be herself again, free of the Suoh estate and finally, for the first time in, admittedly, years, she could be happy.

As the last chords of Rewrite faded into a decibel range she couldn't hear, Tsubaki dragged her hands off the keys, her heart racing as it pumped her adrenaline-filled blood quickly throughout her body. Her body had energy coiled all up her arms and legs, every bone in her body excited as her smile opened up enough to release a laugh that had been bubbling up from inside her, long overdue, since she'd first seen the beautiful instrument. The sound of her laugh ricocheted back to her off of the glass ceiling and the thick walls, echoing her delight. She didn't notice the clapping behind her until she'd simmered down to giggles. When she finally noticed the clapping, she turned around with a smirk. And there stood Tamaki Suoh.

_So this is the boy I'm trying to help…_ Tsubaki thought, although she couldn't very well call him a boy. He was a very tall young man, with blond hair and purple eyes. He wore a uniform to the Ouran Academy private school, the purple jacket much lighter than his eyes. His clothes seemed so regal, clean and pressed the way they were. Tsubaki suddenly wondered if Tamaki Suoh even needed her help. He seemed like a very powerful and influential person, just by the way he stood and how composed he seemed. He didn't even seem shaken by her smirk, which surprised her. When she'd gone to public school, many of her classmates seemed thrown by her smirk, calling it scary.

"Your performance was beautiful, young one. You must be Tsubaki-san. Let me introduce myself properly. I am Tamaki Suoh." He gave her a graceful bow. _As if he were addressing a lady_, Tsubaki thought.

"Nice to meet you, and thank you very much, Suoh-san." Tsubaki frowned as soon as words passed her lips. His voice sounded fluid and smooth when he spoke. Her own sounded rough and inconsistent in comparison.

Tamaki Suoh just gave Tsubaki a genuine smile and said, "Please, call me Tamaki."

Tsubaki stood there watching him smile and didn't realize what she'd said until the words were out of her mouth. "I don't know why I'm here, Tamaki." Tsubaki's voice broke as she said, "I want to go home."

Before she knew it, Tsubaki was crying. Her hands and vest caught the tears dripping off her face as she wept.

"I want my mom back! I wanna go home again!" she sobbed. The brave face before her contorted slightly, and Tsubaki saw tears slide down the chiseled face of Tamaki Suoh. Tsubaki's crying had provoked Tamaki's eyes to water up, and just as Tsubaki wished for the two things she could never have, so Tamaki pined after the exact same thing.

The silent bond formed between them from these tears said all the things they couldn't. _I understand what you're feeling._ After the two had cried their fair share of tears from this experience, Tamaki explained that he'd wished to meet her earlier—in which format he said, "I wished to make your acquaintance sooner than this"—but the times he'd been allowed to visit her room were the times she so meticulously planned and scheduled to leave the room vacant. Tsubaki explained that her mom was in rehab for illicit drug use and that she was more than just a guest in Tamaki's home—she was his foster sister.

After they had spoken, they realized something: not only were their situations almost completely different, they had nothing they could think of in common with each other aside from that they could both play the piano. Tsubaki started laughing.

"What's so funny?" Tamaki asked, confused.

"We're so different. We barely know each other, and the only two things that we have in common is that we can play the piano and that we want to go home. We live in two _completely different worlds_, but we can somehow understand how the other feels. I think it's the most hilarious and exhilarating thing I've experienced in my life!" Tsubaki giggled. She didn't think anyone in the world, not even Tamaki Suoh, could understand what exactly she was feeling at that moment.

Tamaki stood there for a minute, thinking, and before even 5 seconds passed they were laughing together, just two people who, for a moment, shared a laugh at their ridiculous worlds.

Tamaki and Tsubaki spent the few remaining hours before dark together outside, talking about things they liked and when the other didn't understand—which was quite often—they had their own silly ways of expressing their ideas to one another. As the sun began to set, Tsubaki said, "I don't think I've had this much fun in a long time."

"Really? Why's that?" Tamaki asked her.

"I was always worrying about one thing or another before they took my mom. And without her, I just can't make myself feel happy. I miss her so much…" Tsubaki trailed off, watching the sun go down beyond the horizon.

"I know. I haven't seen my mother since I was 14, back in France. But I've tried to be as happy as I could here in Japan. It's much better now that I've made friends and started the Host Club, the one I was telling you about," he explained.

"I should come to Ouran, just one time, to meet everyone. They all sound like amazing people, annoyances and all," Tsubaki told him.

Silence proceeded as the last of the sun's rays began to fall, and finally, Tsubaki spoke again.

"Tamaki?" 

"Mh?"

"Can you promise me something?"

"Sure."

"You don't even know what the promise is yet!"

"I'll endeavor to comply regardless of what it is."

"Promise me that one day, you and I will meet each other again, and we'll both bring our moms. And we'll all have the time of our lives. Promise me. Cos you can't forget me if you don't break this promise. You'll have to always remember and find some time in your packed schedule in, like, ten years! I gotta plan ahead and get an appointment set in advance, like in those movies!" Tsubaki insisted, as Tamaki chuckled.

"You promise, right?" Tsubaki asked.

"I promise, on my honor as a man," he vowed. Tsubaki yawned and said her goodbyes. As she went to her "room", she decided that maybe, just maybe, having a foster brother like Tamaki Suoh would make things less miserable. As she crawled under the sheets that night, Tsubaki whispered to herself the prayer for her mom's quick return to her as well as to stay friends with Tamaki forever. Maybe even stay his foster sister, in a way, after she went home. _I guess it's nice sometimes to be a little sister…_


End file.
